THE    RECOVERY   OF  A 
LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

A  STUDY  IN  HONOR  OF  BERNADOTTE  PERRIN 

BY   HENRY  B.  WRIGHT 


THE   RECOVERY  OF  A 
LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 


BERNADOTTE  PERRIN,  Ph.D.,  LL.D. 


THE   RECOVERY   OF  A 
LOST   ROMAN   TRAGEDY 

A   STUDY   IN   HONOR   OF   BERNADOTTE 

PERRIN,  PH.D.,  LL.D.,  PROFESSOR 

IN    YALE    UNIVERSITY 

1893-1909 


BY 
HENRY  B.  WRIGHT 


YALE    UNIVERSITY   PRESS 

NEW  HAVEN.  CONN. 
1910 


Copyright,  1910 
BY  YALE  UNIVEBSITT  PRESS 


The  Plimpton  Preit  Norwood  Matt.  U.S.A. 


INTRODUCTION 

Somewhat  more  than  a  year  ago,  on  a  morning 
in  the  late  spring,  the  fondest  dream  of  a  stu- 
dent's life  came  true.  Across  the  blue  waters  of 
the  ^Egean  Sea,  in  the  first  pink  flush  of  a  fault- 
less Eastern  dawn,  there  rose  to  meet  his  eager 
gaze  a  city  which  he  had  never  seen,  but  which 
he  yet  seemed  to  know  as  if  it  had  been  his  own. 
A  few  hours  later,  after  the  steamer  had  made  its 
way  through  the  remaining  stretch  of  the  Saronic 
Gulf,  and  had  dropped  anchor  in  the  quiet  of  the 
Piraeus,  he  found  himself  for  the  first  time  within 
the  precincts  of  Attica,  on  the  soil  of  Hellas.  Few, 
indeed,  were  the  hours  which  circumstance  had 
allotted  to  that  first  spring-time  sojourn  on  ground 
so  new  and  yet  so  strangely  familiar;  —  so  few, 
that  many  times  before  the  pilgrim  had  embarked 
upon  his  trip  he  had  even  questioned  the  wisdom 
of  attempting  it  at  all.  In  three  short  weeks  his 
pilgrimage  was  at  an  end  and  he  had  set  face 
toward  the  West.  But  then  neither  misgivings  nor 
regrets  were  in  his  heart.  He  was  returning  from 
the  richest  experience  of  his  life.  For  him,  in 
every  place  and  at  every  hour  on  that  enchanted 
soil,  the  curtains  of  time  which  screen  the  past 

[1] 


2023869 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

seemed  in  a  wondrous  way  to  have  parted.  The 
din  of  the  centuries  which  drowns  the  voices  of 
old  had  somehow  been  mysteriously  stilled.  The 
battle-fields  of  Greece  had  filled  again  with  war- 
ring Eastern  hordes  and  tiny  armies  of  undaunted 
patriots.  Her  shrines,  dimly  discerned  at  first  as 
lonely  broken  columns,  had  built  themselves  up, 
stone  upon  stone,  to  the  semblance  of  their  ancient 
beauty.  Her  agoras  and  streets  had  been  filled 
once  more  with  men  and  women  of  the  Greece  that 
was.  And  ever  and  anon,  amidst  the  moving 
throngs  of  peace  and  war,  the  pilgrim  had  seemed 
to  hear  —  so  clearly  that  he  could  not  doubt  their 
identity  —  familiar  voices  of  sweet  cadence  or  of 
stern  command,  the  voices  which,  once  heard, 
remain,  the  undying  voices  of  the  masters  of  the 
past. 

But  how,  one  asks,  had  all  this  come  to  be.  At 
first  the  pilgrim  too  was  mystified.  He  could 
not  say.  But  one  day,  in  the  sweet  quiet  of  a 
lonely  shrine,  another  well-known  voice  fell  softly 
on  his  ears,  and  straightway  then  he  knew.  It 
was  a  voice  as  of  one  who,  from  some  hiding  place 
as  he  supposes,  looks  down  upon  another,  utterly 
unaware  that  his  own  musings  to  himself  are  in 
turn  by  that  one  overheard.  It  spoke  in  quiet 
tones  of  kindly  satisfaction,  as  if  some  truth 
which  it  had  long  tried  to  teach  was  now  being 
demonstrated  beyond  the  shadow  of  a  doubt  to 
the  certain  advantage  of  those  for  whom  it  had 

[2] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

originally  been  uttered.    These  were  the  words 
which  at  that  hour  on  Attic  soil  the  pilgrim  heard : 

"The  academic  student  of  the  present  day  may  not  be 
so  impressed  and  dominated  by  the  immediate  personality 
of  his  teacher  as  his  predecessors  were;  but  he  may  be, 
and  is,  more  than  ever  before,  brought  by  the  narrower 
specialist  who  now  teaches  him  into  the  immediate  presence 
of  the  great  personalities  of  the  ages,  in  all  lines  of  human 
thought  and  achievement;  in  closer  touch,  for  example, 
with  Plato,  Aristotle,  and  St.  Paul,  whose  personalities  are 
more  powerfully  transmitted  through  the  self-effacing 
medium  of  the  specialist  than  they  were  through  that  of 
the  older  teachers  in  more  and  larger  fields.  The  modern 
university  student  is  brought  face  to  face  rather  with  the  very 
processes  of  history  and  nature  than  with  special  interpre- 
tations and  attractive  demonstrations  of  them." 

Then  the  voice  ceased,  nor  was  it  heard  again 
on  Attic  soil.  The  voices  of  the  masters  of  the 
past  broke  forth  anew,  clearer  and  more  insistent 
to  be  heard  and  understood.  But  the  pilgrim's 
heart  was  full,  with  a  gratitude  which  he  could  not 
express.  For  now  he  knew  whose  secret  musings 
he  had  overheard.  It  was  the  voice  of  his  old 
guide,  his  guide  to  the  heart  of  Greece. 

Thrice  blessed  they  for  whom  this  faithful  in- 
terpreter and  masterly  choregus  has  drawn  the 
heavy  curtains  of  time  from  before  the  matchless 
drama  of  the  past.  Narrower  specialist?  Self- 
effacing  medium?  Yes,  in  a  certain  sense  he  may 
be  so;  because  in  our  time  to  some  extent  every 
teacher  must  so  be.  But  when  the  play  is  through 
[3] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

and  the  actors  have  bowed  their  prettiest,  we  who 
realize  the  unseen  and  too  often  unrecognized  effort 
behind  the  scenes  which  has  alone  made  possible 
our  apprehension  of  those  portrayals  of  life  that 
have  laid  hold  upon  and  thrilled  our  hearts,  will 
never  leave  our  seats  until  he  too,  the  choregus, 
has  come  forth  before  the  curtain,  to  greet  old 
friends  who  bring  their  tokens  of  respect  and  love, 
and  at  the  same  time,  it  must  be,  to  make  many  new 
ones.  And  that  is  why  this  little  book  is  written. 


[4] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 
BERNADOTTE  PERRIN 

CAREER  AS  STUDENT  AND  TEACHER 

Prepared  for  college  at  the  Goshen  Academy,  the  New 
Britain,  and  Hartford  High  Schools;  at  the  latter  institu- 
tion under  the  instruction  of  Samuel  M.  Capron. 

B.A.,  Yale,  1869,  with  Philosophical  Oration  appoint- 
ment. 

Instructor  in  the  Hartford  High  School,  1869-70. 

Student  in  the  Yale  Theological  School,  1870-71,  under 
Timothy  Dwight,  George  P.  Fisher,  and  Samuel  Harris. 

Student  in  the  Yale  Graduate  School,  1871-73,  under 
William  D.  Whitney,  Lewis  R.  Packard,  and  James  Hadley. 

Assistant  in  Greek  at  Yale,  1871-72,  during  the  illness 
of  Professor  Hadley. 

Ph.D.,  Yale,  1873,  "A  Comparison  of  the  Electra  Trag- 
edies in  Greek  Literature." 

Tutor  in  Greek  at  Yale,  1873-74. 

Assistant  Principal  of  the  Hartford  High  School,  1874-76. 

Pursued  advanced  studies  abroad,  1876-78:  at  Tubingen, 
under  Roth;  at  Leipzig,  under  Georg  Curtius,  Ribbeck, 
and  Lipsius;  at  Berlin,  under  Vahlen  and  Kirchhoff. 

Tutor  in  Greek  at  Yale,  1878-79. 

Assistant  Principal  of  the  Hartford  High  School,  1879-80. 

Professor  of  Greek  at  Western  Reserve  University,  1880- 
1893:  Special  Student  of  Archaeology  at  the  Berlin  Museum, 
summer  of  1887;  Special  Student  of  Archaeology  in  Greece, 
1890. 

LL.D.,  Western  Reserve,  1893. 

Professor  of  the  Greek  Language  and  Literature  at  Yale 
University,  1893-1901:  Lecturer  on  Greek  History  and 

[5] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

Literature,  University  Summer  Extension  Meeting,  Phila- 
delphia, 1895;  President  of  the  American  Philological  Asso- 
ciation, 1897;  Member  of  the  Committee  of  Ten  of  the  New 
England  History  Teachers'  Association,  1901. 

Public  Orator  of  Yale  University,  1898-1908. 

Lampson  Professor  of  Greek,  Yale  University,  1901-09 
(of  Greek  Language  and  Literature,  1901-02;  of  Greek 
Literature  and  History,  1902-09) ;  Special  Student  of  Greek 
History  in  Sicily  and  Greece  and  Lecturer  at  the  Ameri- 
can School  at  Athens,  1904-05. 


SURVEY  OF  COURSES  TAUGHT  AT  YALE,  1893-1909 

(a)  UNDERGRADUATE 

THE  ATHENIAN  DRAMA  (Sophomores).  1893-1903,  in- 
clusive (the  three  tragedies  varying  each  year). 

The  Prometheus  Bound  of  Aeschylus,  the  Antigone  of 
Sophocles,  the  Medea  of  Euripides,  and  the  Frogs  of  Aris- 
tophanes will  be  read  in  class,  and  possibly  other  plays 
assigned  for  private  reading.  A  course  of  ten  or  twelve 
lectures  will  be  given  on  the  Greek  Theater,  on  the  origin, 
evolution  and  history  of  the  Greek  Drama,  and  its  influence 
on  subsequent  dramatic  literature.  In  reading  these  plays 
special  emphasis  will  be  laid  on  their  analysis  as  works  of 
literary  art,  on  the  myths  which  they  pre-suppose  and  de- 
velop, on  poetic  words,  forms,  dictions,  rhythms,  and  con- 
structions. Grammatical  questions  will  be  discussed  only 
when  they  are  important  for  the  interpretation  and  illus- 
tration of  the  thought. 

ARISTOPHANES.  The  Testimony  of  Old  Athenian  Comedy 
to  the  Political  and  Social  Life  of  its  Time  (Juniors  and 
Seniors).  1895-6,  1897-8. 

The  Acharnians,  Knights,  Wasps,  Birds,  and  Plutus  will 

[6] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

be  read  entire,  together  with  extracts  from  the  other  plays 
and  some  of  the  more  notable  fragments.  .  .  .  The  plays 
will  be  analyzed  as  artistic  literary  creations,  and  their 
testimony  to  the  history  of  the  period  collected  and  weighed. 

GREEK  SOCIAL  AND  PRIVATE  LIFE  (Juniors  and  Seniors). 
1895-6,  1897-8. 

In  close,  though  not  necessary  connection  with  the  above 
course  in  Aristophanes,  a  weekly  quiz,  conference  or  lecture 
will  be  held  on  the  social  and  private  life,  the  customs,  man- 
ners, and  most  prevalent  beliefs  of  the  ancient  Greeks, 
particularly  the  Athenians. 

THE  TESTIMONIES  OF  ARISTOPHANES,  THUCYDIDES,  AND 
PLUTARCH,  TO  THE  CAREER  OF  NICIAS,  1899-1900  [Nicias 
and  Cleon,  1901-02,  1905-06;  Pericles,  1903-04,  1906-07; 
Alcibiades,  1907-08].  (Juniors  and  Seniors.) 

A  study  of  literary  forms  (Old  Athenian  Comedy,  His- 
tory, Biography),  and  historical  tradition.  Reading  of  one 
comedy  of  Aristophanes  with  investigation  of  the  other 
comedies;  analysis  of  the  history  of  Thucydides,  and  read- 
ing of  all  passages  bearing  on  the  special  subject;  reading 
and  analysis  of  a  biography  of  Plutarch. 

OUTLINE  SURVEY  OF  ANCIENT  HISTORY  (Juniors  and 
Seniors).  1899-1904,  1906-O9. 

Lectures,  following  manual  study,  outlining  such  general 
features  of  ancient  history,  from  the  earliest  civilization  of 
the  Euphrates  to  the  Empire  of  Charlemagne,  as  are  most 
helpful  to  the  study  of  medieval  history.  Oriental  history 
is  presented  only  as  a  background  and  source  for  Greek  and 
Roman  History. 

HISTORY  OF  GREECE  TO  THE  ROMAN  CONQUEST  (Juniors 
and  Seniors),  1905-06,  1907-08. 

[7] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

A  detailed  and  systematic  study  of  the  political,  intel- 
lectual, and  artistic  history  of  the  ancient  Hellenes,  with 
suitable  illustrations  from  their  literature  and  monuments. 
Lectures,  conferences,  and  recitations. 

HOMER,  HERODOTUS,  AND  PLATO  (Freshmen).     1906-08. 

Selections  from  the  Odyssey,  XIII-XXIV,  in  the  Greek, 
and  reading  of  the  entire  Odyssey  in  a  standard  literary 
translation;  Herodotus,  VI  and  VII,  in  the  Greek,  and  read- 
ing of  the  entire  history  in  a  standard  translation;  Plato's 
Apology  and  parts  of  the  Crito  and  Phaedo  in  the  Greek, 
and  reading  of  the  Euthyphro,  Crito  and  Phaedo,  together 
with  Xenophon's  Memorabilia,  in  standard  translations.  The 
object  of  the  course  is  to  give  the  student  an  acquaintance 
at  first  and  second  hand  with  the  entire  Odyssey,  the  entire 
history  of  Herodotus,  and  the  personality  and  teaching  of 
Socrates  as  depicted  by  two  of  his  disciples. 

(6)  GRADUATE 

CLASSICAL  SEMINARY.  Herodotus  IV -IX,  and  the  Tra- 
dition of  the  History  of  the  Persian  Wars  through  Herodotus 
and  Thucydides  to  Plutarch.  1893-94,  1896-97,  1900-01, 
1903-04. 

Studies  in  historical  source-criticism.  Apparatus  re- 
quired: (1)  Standard  texts  of  Herodotus,  Thucydides, 
Diodorus  Siculus,  and  Plutarch;  (2)  Busolt,  Griechische 
Geschichte,  Bd.  II,  Gotha,  1895;  (3)  Hauvette,  Herodote, 
Paris,  1894;  (4)  Wachsmuth,  Einleitung  in  das  Studium  der 
alien  Geschichte,  Leipzig,  1895;  (5)  Bauer,  Plutarch's  The- 
mistokles,  Leipzig,  1884,  and  Themistokles,  Merseburg,  1881. 
All  other  apparatus  is  supplied  by  the  University  and  De- 
partment libraries,  —  such  as  the  fragments  of  the  Greek 
historians  and  the  pertinent  Greek  inscriptions.  Students 
admitted  to  this  course  are  expected  to  read  French  and 
German  freely,  and  it  is  for  their  advantage  to  have  read 

[8] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

beforehand  Herodotus,  and  Plutarch's  Aristides  and   The- 
mistocles. 

THE  TRADITION  OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  ALEXANDER.  1894- 
95. 

Lectures  and  Seminary  exercises.  A  critical  study  of 
the  sources  of  the  history  of  Alexander,  from  the  letters  of 
Alexander  himself  and  the  Journals,  through  the  Anabasis 
of  Arrian  and  the  Alexander  of  Plutarch.  The  treatment 
of  their  authorities  in  the  histories  of  Alexander  by 
Thirlwall,  Grote,  Droysen,  and  Holm  is  compared.  A 
reading  acquaintance  with  German  is  indispensable  for  the 
successful  prosecution  of  this  course. 

PAUSANIAS.     1894-95,  1895-96,  1897-98. 

Lectures  and  Seminary  Exercises.  A  practical  intro- 
duction to  Pausanias,  and  a  critical  reading  of  his  descrip- 
tion of  Olympia,  with  illustrations  from  the  excavations  of 
1876-81.  The  complete  Teubner  text  of  Pausanias  will  be 
the  only  text-book  required. 

THUCYDIDES  AND  THE  HISTORICAL  TRADITION  OF  THE 
PENTECONTAETIA.  1898-99,  1902-03. 

(a)  A  course  of  lectures  will  be  given  on  the  History  of 
Thucydides,  its  genesis,  sources,  composition,  and  termina- 
tion; and  on  the  design,  spirit,  and  methods  of  the  writer. 

(6)  The  lPentecontaetia  (I,  89-117)  will  be  critically  read 
in  class  (the  rest  of  the  work  being  assigned  for  private  read- 
ing), other  principal  testimonies  to  the  history  of  this  period 
collected  and  weighed,  and  the  literary  tradition  of  the  his- 
tory of  the  period  from  Thucydides  to  Plutarch  examined. 
Plutarch's  Cimon  and  Pericles  will  be  read  with  special 
reference  to  their  sources.  The  apparatus  required  in  the 
hands  of  each  student  taking  the  course  will  be:  Hude, 
Thucydidis  Historiae,  Leipzig,  Teubner,  Vol.  I,  1898,  Vol.  II, 

[9] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

1902;  Hill,  Sources  for  Greek  History  between  the  Persian 
and  Peloponnesian  Wars,  Oxford,  Clarendon  Press,  1897; 
Busolt,  Griechische  Geschichte,  Band  III,  Teil  I,  Gotha, 
Perthes,  1897;  and  the  Teubner  (Sintenis)  text  of  the  Cimon 
and  Pericles  of  Plutarch. 

THE  WASPS  OF  ARISTOPHANES.     1901-02. 

Introduction  to  the  critical  and  historical  study  of  Aris- 
tophanes. Establishment  of  the  text  of  the  Wasps  and 
exhaustive  interpretation  of  the  same;  elements  and  forms 
of  old  Athenian  Comedy;  reflections  and  survivals  of  Aris- 
tophanic  comedy  in  Roman  and  modern  comedy. 

THUCYDIDES.     1905-06,  1907-08. 

Practical  exercises  in  the  critical  study  of  the  text  of 
Thucydides,  following  lectures  on  the  manuscript  and  bib- 
liography of  this  author.  An  introduction  to  the  work  of 
the  Classical  Seminary. 

CLASSICAL  SEMINARY.     Greek  History.     1906-07. 

Exhaustive  critical  discussion,  from  all  available  sources, 
of  disputed  points  on  Greek  History,  where  the  primary 
authorities  are  Herodotus,  Thucydides,  Xenophon,  Polybius, 
or  Arrian. 

OUTLINE  SURVEY  OF  ANCIENT  HISTORY.     1908-09, 
An  expansion  of  the  undergraduate  course,  with  special 
attention  to  bibliography. 

CLASSICAL  SEMINARY.     Theocritus.     1908-09. 
Critical,   exegetical,    and   historical   studies   in   selected 
Idylls  of  Theocritus. 


10] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Caesar's  Civil  War.  University  Publishing  Co.,  New  York.  1882. 

Lucan   as  Historical  Source  for  Appian,  Am.  Jour,  of  Phil.   V    (1884) 

pp.  325-30. 
The  Crastinus  Episode  at  Palsepharsalus,  Trans.  Am.  Phil.  Asso.  XV  (1884) 

pp.  46-57. 
Pharsalia,    Pharsalus,    Paleepharsalus,    Am.    Jour,    of   Phil.    VI    (1885) 

pp.  170-189. 
Equestrianism   in    the   Doloneia,    Trans.  Am.   Phil.   Asso.   XVI    (1885) 

pp.  104-15. 
The  Odyssey  under  Historical  Source  Criticism,  Am.  Jour,  of  Phil.  VIII 

(1887)  pp.  415-32. 
Homer's  Odyssey,  Books  1-IV  (College  Series  of  Greek  Authors),  Ginn  &  Co., 

Boston,  1889. 
Homer's  Odyssey,  Books  V-VI1I  (College  Series  of  Greek  Authors),  Ginn  & 

Co.,  Boston,  1894. 
Genesis  and  Growth  of  an  Alexander  Myth,  Trans.  Am.  Phil.  Asso.  XXVI 

(1895)  pp.  56-68. 
Notes   on   the   NEKUIA   of   Peisandros,    Proceedings   Am.   Phil.   Asso. 

XXVII  (1896)  pp.  XXXIV-XXXV. 
School  Odyssey,  Eight   Books   and  Vocabulary  (with  Professor  Seymour), 

Ginn  &  Co.,  Boston,  1897. 
Papers  of  the  American  School  of  Classical  Studies  at  Athens  (Editor), 

Vol.  VI,  1890-7. 
The  Ethics  and  Amenities  of  Greek  Historiography,  Am.  Jour,  of  Phil. 

XVIII  (1897)  pp.  255-74. 
Plutarch's    Themistacles   and   Aristides   (Yale  Bicentennial   Publications), 

Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  New  York,  1901. 

Yale's  Fourth  Jubilee.  Atlantic  Monthly,  October,  1901,  pp.  449-459. 
Joint  Editor,  A  History  Syllabus  for  Secondary  Schools,  Outline  of  Ancient 

History,  D.  C.  Heath  &  Co.,  Boston,  1901  and  1904. 
The  IEREIAI  of  Hellanicus  and  the  Burning  of  the  Argive  Heraeum,  Am. 

Jour,  of  Phil.  XXII  (1901)  pp.  39-43. 
Editor  with  John  H.  Wright  of  Harvard  and  Andrew  F.  West  of  Princeton 

of  Twentieth  Century  Text  Books,  Classical  Section  (D.  Appleton  &  Co.), 

1901-1904. 

[11] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

The  Nikias  of  Pasiphon  and  Plutarch.  Trans.  Am.  Phil.  Asso.  XXXIII 

(1902)  pp.  139-149. 
The  Fiscal  Joke  of  Pericles,  Proceedings  Am.  Phil.  Asso.  XXXIV  (1903) 

p.  XX. 
The  Rehabilitation  of  Theramenes,  Amer.  Hist.  Rev.  IX  (1904)  pp.  649- 

669. 
Mr.  Rhodes's  History  of  the  United  States,  Atlantic  Monthly,  June,  1907, 

pp.  859-867. 
The   Death    of    Alcibiades,    Trans.   Am.   Phil.  Asso.    XXXVII   (1906) 

pp.  25-37. 
The  Hunters  of  Euboea,  translated  from  the  Greek  of  Dio  Chrysostomos, 

published  by  the  Kit  Kat  Club  of  Yale  University,  New  Haven,  1908. 
The  Austere  Consistency  of  Pericles  (Plut.  Per.  IX-XV),  Leipziger  Fest- 
schrift, Trans.  Conn.  Acad.  of  Arts  and  Sci.  July,  1909,  pp.  219-224. 
Recognition  Scenes  in  Greek  literature,  Am.  Jour,  of  Phil.  XXX  (1909) 

pp.  371-404. 


12] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 


I  remember  well  the  first  time  that  I  met  him  — 
my  guide  to  the  heart  of  Greece.  It  was  in  the 
autumn  of  1895.  He  had  but  recently  come  to 
Yale  from  Western  Reserve  College,  to  take  up  his 
work  as  Professor  of  the  Greek  language  and  liter- 
ature. I  had  elected  the  Sophomore  Greek  course 
in  the  Athenian  Drama,  as  ignorant  of  the  treas- 
ures which  lay  in  store  for  me  as  I  was  then  uncon- 
scious of  the  poverty  of  my  Greek  equipment  —  a 
few  books  of  Xenophon  and  Homer  and  some 
scraps  of  Attic  prose.  I  have  never  forgotten  that 
first  fall  term,  and  the  hush  which  used  to  fall  over 
the  lecture  room  when,  now  and  then,  to  quicken 
and  inspire  our  earnest  but  faltering  efforts,  Pro- 
fessor Perrin  would  gather  up  the  results  of  the 
hour's  work  with  his  own  translation,  which  was 
in  itself  an  adequate  interpretation.  First  there 
would  come  a  reverent  dignified  pause,  and  then, 
as  we  sat  enraptured,  the  lines  of  the  Prometheus 
Bound  would  fall  upon  our  ears  with  a  pathos  in 
their  majestic  beauty  and  a  manliness  in  their  scorn- 
ful defiance  which  only  he  could  have  interpreted 
to  us  who  was  himself  warrior  and  poet  of  the 
truth.  It  was  by  that  course  in  the  Attic  Drama, 
with  its  four  plays  by  the  four  great  playwrights 
Aeschylus,  Sophocles,  Euripides,  and  Aristophanes 
[13] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

—  moral  sublimity,  artistic  perfection,  human  sym- 
pathy, matchless  wit  —  following  one  another  in 
their  historical  sequence,  that  Professor  Perrin  will 
be  longest  remembered  by  the  majority  of  the 
recent  graduates  of  Yale.  For  eleven  successive 
years  he  poured  forth  out  of  his  abundance  into 
the  vacuity  of  his  successive  Sophomore  divisions, 
until  each  year  the  great  thoughts  that  were  his 
became  in  some  measure  theirs  also,  and  they  began 
to  love  Greece  and  to  long  to  know  more  about 
her.  Neither  the  greater  familiarity  with  the 
subject  matter  which  the  repetition  of  the  same 
course  year  after  year  (the  three  tragedies  only 
varying)  brought  to  him,  nor  the  many  calls  of 
committee  work  upon  his  time  and  strength,  ever 
led  him  to  give  to  a  succeeding  class  anything  short 
of  his  best.  And  when  each  recitation  was  fin- 
ished with  the  stamp  of  completeness  upon  it,  we 
all  instinctively  knew  that  we  had  been  in  the 
presence  of  one  who  had  not  begrudged  us  the 
personal  sacrifice  of  letting  power  go  forth  from 
him,  and  who  recognized  as  fundamental  in  his 
creed  that  the  cost  of  all  real  teaching  is  life. 

A  peculiarly  fortunate  combination  of  circum- 
stances had  fitted  Professor  Perrin  for  this  rare 
service  as  interpreter  of  the  spirit  of  Greek  cul- 
ture to  three  successive  college  generations  of 
Yale  men.  He  was  himself  a  son  of  Yale.  In  his 
undergraduate  days  he  had  given  her  of  his  best 
efforts  and  had  received  from  her  in  turn  her  rich- 
[14] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

est  rewards.  His  early  teaching  had  included  both 
high  school  and  college  work,  and  he  therefore  un- 
derstood the  problems  of  the  boy  as  well  as  those 
of  the  man.  When  called  to  the  Professorship  of 
Greek  at  Western  Reserve  in  1880,  he  had  found 
himself  entrusted  with  the  entire  instruction  in 
Greek  in  the  college.  He  had  thus  been  saved 
from  that  premature  narrowing  of  range  of  inter- 
est in  a  given  comprehensive  field  which  often 
falls  to  the  lot  of  those  who  early  become  connected 
with  departments  where  large  portions  of  the  field 
are  already  preempted  by  trained  specialists. 
During  the  thirteen  years  of  his  teaching  at  West- 
ern Reserve,  Professor  Perrin,  with  scholarly 
thoroughness,  introduced  his  students  to  most 
of  the  wise  and  great  men  of  Greece  —  to  Homer, 
Hesiod,  Pindar,  and  the  Lyric  Poets;  to  Aeschylus, 
Sophocles,  Euripides,  and  Aristophanes;  to  Herod- 
otus, Thucydides,  and  the  Orators;  to  Plato  and 
Aristotle;  to  Theocritus  and  Lucian.  And  when 
he  came  to  us  at  Yale,  they  seemed  to  be,  all  of 
them,  his  old  and  treasured  friends. 

There  was  a  second  circumstance  which  played 
an  important  part  in  awakening  in  Professor 
Perrin  those  remarkable  evangelistic  gifts  in  the 
diffusion  of  the  Greek  spirit  and  culture  which 
have  marked  all  his  work  at  Yale.  Two  years 
after  he  became  connected  with  the  faculty  of 
Western  Reserve,  the  college  moved  to  Cleveland, 
Ohio,  where  up  to  that  time  there  had  been  no 
[15] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

institution  of  higher  learning.  To  him  fell  the 
stimulating  pioneer's  task  of  creating,  in  a  grow- 
ing, wide-awake  Western  city,  an  atmosphere  for 
classical  culture  and  art,  and  of  winning  friends  for 
the  Classics.  Public  readings  from  Homer  and 
Euripides  during  the  winter  months  were  the  be- 
ginnings of  an  informal  College  Extension  work 
which  received  added  impetus  at  the  time  of  the 
archaeological  movement  of  the  late  eighties. 
Professor  Perrin  went  to  Berlin  in  the  summer  of 
1887  to  study  the  treasures  of  ancient  art  in  the 
Berlin  Museum.  In  the  spring  of  1890  he  was  in 
Greece  with  Db'rpfeld  and  Von  Wilamowitz.  The 
rich  fruits  of  these  two  foreign  trips  were  embodied 
in  a  series  of  illustrated  lectures  on  the  excavations 
at  Delphi,  Olympia,  and  Pergamon.  Their  influ- 
ence in  the  city  of  Cleveland  was  permanent  and 
far  reaching.  We  at  Yale  felt  the  afterglow  of 
these  earlier  conquests  many  years  later  when,  on 
two  separate  occasions,  he  offered  to  upper  class- 
men a  course  in  Greek  social  life.  On  his  return 
from  a  third  trip  abroad  in  1905,  fresh  from  the 
three  new  conquests  of  Attica,  Sicily,  and  Dante, 
his  same  unswerving  faith  in  the  indispensability 
and  evangelistic  power  of  the  gospel  of  Greek  cul- 
ture which  he  was  called  to  preach,  again  asserted 
itself.  At  the  very  moment  when  the  future  of 
Greek  studies  at  Yale  was  seriously  threatened, 
he  set  himself  to  remodel  the  Freshman  Greek 
course  in  the  interests  of  attractiveness,  with  a 
[16] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

final  result  that,  without  sacrificing  exact  and  care- 
ful work  in  syntax  at  each  recitation,  and  the  actual 
reading  of  considerable  portions  of  the  Greek  text, 
the  student  at  the  same  time  was  able  to  cover 
in  a  single  year,  by  means  of  standard  literary 
translations  used  in  connection  with  the  text,  the 
whole  of  Homer's  Odyssey,  the  entire  History  of 
Herodotus,  and  those  dialogues  and  writings  of 
Plato  and  Xenophon  which  deal  with  the  trial 
and  death  of  Socrates. 

It  was  in  the  above-mentioned  capacity  of 
teacher  and  evangelist  of  Greek  culture  that  the 
majority  of  Yale  students  first  made  acquaintance 
with  Professor  Perrin.  Some  six  years  after  my 
first  recitation  with  him  in  the  course  in  Attic 
Drama,  and  during  the  period  of  my  graduate 
study,  I  came  under  the  influence  of  the  scholar 
and  the  awakener  of  the  scholar's  spirit  in  others. 

Trained  in  his  preparatory  studies  to  thorough- 
ness and  accuracy  by  Samuel  M.  Capron,  gradu- 
ated from  Yale  with  highest  honors  in  all  studies, 
but  showing  special  proficiency  in  English  com- 
position, Professor  Perrin  had  early  given  evidence 
of  that  gift  for  forceful  epigrammatic  statement 
which  has  made  him  the  recognized  public  orator 
of  the  University  and  has  given  to  all  his  lectures 
and  papers  their  peculiar  and  abiding  charm.  He 
completed  his  graduate  study  for  the  doctor's 
degree  at  Yale  under  Whitney,  Fisher,  Hadley, 
and  Packard,  and  then  went  abroad  for  several 
[17] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

years  of  further  study.  His  foreign  teachers  in 
method  were  men  of  the  stamp  of  Roth,  Georg 
Curtius,  Lipsius,  Ribbeck,  Vahlen,  and  Kirchhoff; 
his  fellow  students  and  intimate  friends  then  and 
since,  such  scholars  as  Geltner,  Garbe,  Schroder, 
and  Von  Bradke,  who  were  later  to  occupy  pro- 
fessor's chairs  at  Berlin,  Tubingen,  Vienna,  and 
Marburg.  After  his  return  to  America,  during  the 
period  of  his  teaching  at  Western  Reserve,  his 
advanced  studies  and  published  writings  centered 
mainly  about  Caesar's  Civil  War  and  Homer's 
Odyssey;  but  his  work  in  these  two  fields  had 
already  attracted  such  attention  that  before  he 
left  Western  Reserve  to  come  to  Yale,  a  propo- 
sition had  been  submitted  to  him  to  take  the 
leadership  in  the  founding  of  a  graduate  school 
at  Cleveland. 

An  unusual  situation  in  the  Greek  department 
confronted  Professor  Perrin  when  he  prepared  to 
take  up  his  new  work  at  Yale  in  1893.  The 
majority  of  the  special  fields  to  which  his  tastes 
would  have  inclined  him  were  already  preempted 
by  the  men  who  composed  the  unusually  large 
permanent  teaching  staff  in  Greek.  As  a  result  he 
was  led  to  venture  upon  an  entirely  new  field,  for 
which  his  powers  proved  to  be  admirably  fitted, 
and  in  which  he  was  to  be  the  pioneer  in  American 
scholarship.  This  was  the  application  of  modern 
historical  seminary  methods  to  the  field  of  classi- 
cal history.  Macan  in  England,  and  Eduard 
[18] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

Meyer  in  Germany,  by  their  publications,  brought 
to  the  attention  of  the  world  of  scholarship  many 
points  of  method  and  many  conclusions  in  source- 
criticism  which  he  had  himself  also  reached 
independently  and  taught  for  many  years  in  his 
seminaries,  but  which  press  of  undergraduate  class- 
room work  and  administrative  duties  had  not 
allowed  him  to  revise  for  the  press. 

The  classical  seminary  on  "Herodotus  and  the 
Tradition  of  the  Persian  Wars,"  conducted  by 
Professor  Perrin  in  the  fall  and  winter  of  1900- 
1901,  was  the  decisive  factor  in  the  making  of  my 
own  life  plans.  "The  whole  art  of  education," 
says  Lankester,  "consists  in  exciting  the  desire  to 
know.  By  showing  something  wonderful,  mysteri- 
ous, astounding,  and  marvelous,  dug  from  the 
earth  beneath  our  feet,  we  may  awaken  the  desire 
to  understand  and  learn  more  about  that  thing." 
In  the  first  session  of  that  seminary,  with  the  skilled 
hand  of  the  trained  excavator,  Professor  Perrin,  in 
a  few  deft  strokes,  laid  bare  the  rich  source  deposits 
of  Herodotus,  revealing  to  our  astonished  gaze 
many  a  trace  of  what  we  had  supposed  to  be  a 
vanished  and  irrecoverable  past,  hidden  behind  a 
nebulous  plural,  or  a  gentile  adjective,  or  the  de- 
ceptive parade  of  an  oral  source.  And  when 
his  mining  was  done,  and  many  gaps  in  evidence 
had  been  securely  bridged,  he  caused  to  rise  before 
us  some  semblance  at  least  of  the  supposedly  lost 
witnesses  to  the  past,  of  men  whose  voices,  harsh 

[19] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

and  quaint  as  they  were,  yet  gave  forth  notes  of 
truth  which  we  had  not  heard  before.  Ranging 
these  witnesses  before  us,  he  prepared  to  interro- 
gate them  one  after  the  other  in  order,  in  that 
most  fascinating  of  all  researches,  the  quest  for 
historic  truth.  Then  came  the  searching  cross- 
examination  —  the  detection  of  the  needle  of  truth 
in  the  haymow  of  rhetoric;  the  nursing  back 
to  some  semblance  of  its  former  self  of  a  state- 
ment which  perchance  had  been  stretched  and 
twisted  on  the  Procrustean  bed  of  a  literary  form. 
Finally,  when  gossip  and  malice  and  rhetoric  had 
been  disconcerted  and  silenced,  the  long  row  of 
witnesses  would  be  dismissed  from  our  sight,  and 
there  would  pass  before  us,  issuing  from  the  day's 
gleaning  of  historic  fact,  not  that  motley  array  of 
harlequins,  and  prodigies,  and  impossible  beings 
whom  tradition  had  taught  us  to  believe  had 
played  parts  in  the  drama  of  Ancient  History,  but 
a  dignified  and  stately  procession  of  men  with 
like  passions  to  our  own,  each  one  filling  his 
peculiar  function  in  the  divine  and  reasonable  plan 
of  the  onward  march  of  civilization. 

Professor  Perrin  began  his  advanced  teaching  of 
Greek  History  where  all  true  scholarship  instinc- 
tively begins,  not  with  a  presentation  of  results 
achieved  by  others,  but  with  the  critical  interpre- 
tation of  his  original  sources.  He  insisted  that  the 
professor  of  Ancient  History  must  be  student  and 
teacher  of  both  literature  and  history  if  the  search 
[20] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

for  truth  in  first  hand  documents  were  not  to  be 
slighted  for  the  mere  collating  of  results.  His 
courses  in  source-criticism  being  thus  historico- 
literary  in  character,  were  always  offered  in  the 
department  of  classical  literature,  where  a  given 
fact  could  be  approached  through  a  historical 
study  of  the  various  literary  forms  in  which  it  had 
successively  found  lodgment.  The  method  is  well 
set  forth  in  the  prospectus  of  lectures  which  he, 
with  other  prominent  American  Hellenists,  de- 
livered on  "Greek  Life  and  Thought,"  at  the 
University  Extension  Summer  Meeting  at  the 
University  of  Pennsylvania  in  1895.  The  purpose 
of  his  lectures  on  "A  Biographical  Survey  of  Greek 
History"  was  stated  to  be,  "to  compare  the  latest 
literary  form  of  the  ancient  historical  tradition 
with  the  earliest  attainable  literary  form  of  the 
same  tradition,  and  to  show  what  changes  have 
occurred."  A  glance  at  the  list  of  courses  offered 
by  Professor  Perrin  in  the  Yale  graduate  school  for 
the  past  sixteen  years  will  show  how  exhaustively 
he  had  covered  the  field  of  source-criticism  in 
Greek  History,  although  in  the  guise  of  a  teacher 
of  Greek  Literature,  and  how  well  fitted  he  was  to 
be  the  organizer  of  a  department  of  Ancient  History 
at  Yale.  His  first  distinct  course  in  the  History 
Department  —  the  Outline  Survey  of  Ancient 
History — was  offered  in  1899-1900.  In  recognition 
of  his  conviction  as  to  the  double  function  of  the 
Ancient  Historian,  the  title  of  his  chair  at  Yale 
[21] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

was  changed  in  1901  to  the  Lampson  Professorship 
of  Greek  Literature  and  History. 

There  remains  to  be  added  a  word  regarding 
Professor  Perrin's  published  works.  His  match- 
less English  translation  of  Plutarch's  Themistocles 
and  Aristides,  with  historical  and  literary  notes, 
which  was  his  contribution  to  Yale's  Bicentennial, 
is  too  well  and  favorably  known  to  need  comment 
here.  Conspicuous  as  illustrative  of  his  method, 
among  the  dozen  or  more  occasional  papers  which 
he  has  published  since  coming  to  Yale,  are  the 
three  dealing  with  the  genesis  and  growth  of 
historical  myths,  the  essay  on  "The  Rehabilitation 
of  Theramenes,"  and  that  on  "The  lereiai  of  Hel- 
lanicus  and  the  Burning  of  the  Argive  Heraeum." 
His  address  as  President  of  the  American  Philo- 
logical Association  on  "The  Ethics  and  Amenities 
of  Greek  Historiography"  is  as  remarkable  for 
its  originality  and  relentless  keenness  in  the  detec- 
tion of  processes  of  perversion,  as  in  its  careful 
appreciation  of  extenuating  circumstances  in  the 
procedure  of  those  authors  who  are  exposed  and 
sentenced  before  the  bar  of  truth. 


[22] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 


Unskilful  as  have  been,  I  fear,  my  efforts  in  this 
little  introduction,  I  yet  rejoice,  my  honored  guide* 
that  they  have  made  it  impossible  for  you,  this 
day  at  least,  to  shun  with  wonted  modesty  the 
plaudits  now  that  the  play  is  over.  You  are  to 
leave  our  stage  at  Yale  where,  for  four  college 
generations,  what  was  at  first  a  careless  crowd  of 
youth  filling  your  auditorium,  has  always  sobered 
and  grown  reverent  and  thoughtful  under  the 
spell  of  your  "Odysseus,"  your  "Antigone,"  your 
"Socrates."  In  those  matchless  interpretations  of 
the  past  which  once  were  ours  alone,  a  larger 
public  now  demands  its  right  to  share;  and  having 
seen  your  "  Themistocles  and  Aristides,"  urges, 
with  an  insistence  which  you  cannot  well  ignore, 
its  claim  to  your  services  as  choregus  for  a  "  Cimon 
and  Pericles,"  a  "Nicias  and  Alcibiades,"  and  a 
"Demosthenes  and  Alexander."  God  bless  you 
richly  in  this  larger  sphere !  When,  at  your  bidding, 
fresh  portrayals  of  the  rich  life  of  the  past  shall 
appear,  we  too  shall  mingle  in  the  larger  audience 
who  rejoice  and  profit  in  them,  perhaps  lost  to 
your  sight  in  the  greater  sea  of  faces;  with  voices 
undistinguishable  amidst  its  greater  applause.  But 
of  one  thing,  we  trust,  you  will  still  be  sure.  The 
greater  auditorium  may  ring  with  louder  plaudits 
[23] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

than  did  the  small  theater  of  the  olden  days;  but 
none  can  ever  love  you  more  than  we. 

A  little  token  of  respect  and  love  we  bring  to 
you  —  the  first  fruits  of  a  tiro's  independent  exca- 
vations in  a  much  worked  field.  If  wise  men  shall 
decide  that  there  is  truth  in  what  it  strives  to 
show,  it  may  perhaps  be  thought  a  worthy  gift, 
for  it  would  seem  to  fix  the  structure  of  a  lost 
literary  form  regarding  which  men  have  hitherto 
been  much  in  the  dark.  If  wise  men  shall  decide 
that  there  is  error,  it  may  yet  serve  a  useful  pur- 
pose in  warning  of  the  dangers  in  the  application 
of  a  method,  sound  enough  in  itself,  to  a  field 
where  absence  of  evidence  makes  it  impossible  to 
either  establish  or  overthrow  the  majority  of  con- 
clusions. It  will  then  be  but  another  example  of 
what  you  yourself  have  often  termed  "that  fas- 
cinating, but  for  the  most  part  fruitless  search  for 
ultimate  sources." 

But  forget  not,  even  if  the  latter  be  the  case» 
that  the  prompting  to  the  task,  if  not  the  method 
and  result,  was  the  master's  work;  and  that  the 
tiro,  once  convinced  of  error,  grateful  for  its  dis- 
covery, will  yet  continue  in  the  quest  for  truth  in 
that  life  passion  which  the  master  inspired.  And 
like  one  of  old,  that  he  may  in  future  be  kept  truer 
to  the  more  scholarly  ideals  and  sounder  methods 
of  that  master,  a  single  prayer  will  be  ever  upon 
his  lips  till  it  be  accomplished  —  "Let  the  eldest 
son's  portion  of  thy  spirit  rest  upon  me." 
[24] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 


THE  RECOVERY  OF  A  LOST  ROMAN 
TRAGEDY 

In  a  recent  study  of  the  sources  of  early  Roman 
history,1  Wilhelm  Soltau  has  presented  a  convin- 
cing array  of  evidence  in  support  of  a  suggestion 
made  by  him  in  an  earlier  and  now  well  known 
monograph.2  As  against  the  theories  of  Niebuhr, 
of  Pais,  and  of  still  a  third  school  who  would  see 
in  Livy  a  gifted  Roman  Herodotus,  he  seeks  to 
prove  that  the  traditions  of  early  Roman  History 
as  we  now  know  them,  owe  their  form  and  in 
large  degree  also  their  substance,  not  to  a  body  of 
lost  native  folk-lays,  nor  to  a  blend  of  primitive 
Greek  and  Roman  myths,  not  yet  to  the  dramatic 
and  narrative  powers  of  a  romantic  historian,  but 
to  the  clothing  of  gaunt  and  meager  Roman  family 
traditions  with  borrowings  from  the  whole  cloth 
of  Greek  drama  and  history  by  Roman  dramatists 
of  the  third  and  second  centuries  B.C.  In  Soltau's 
estimation  the  most  fruitful  single  source  for  the 
writing  of  that  portion  of  the  history  of  Rome 
which  extends  from  the  earliest  times  to  the  first 
Punic  War  was  the  Roman  National  Drama  of 
Naevius,  Ennius,  Pacuvius,  and  Accius. 

1  Soltau,  Die  Anfange  der  romischen  Geschichtschreibung  (Leipzig,  1909). 
1  Soltau,  Livius'  Geschichtswerk  (Leipzig,  1897). 

[25] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

Of  the  one  hundred  or  more  Roman  tragedies 
of  the  period  of  the  republic  known  to  us  by 
name,  not  one  has  survived  entire.  Only  eight 
can  be  surely  recognized  from  external  evidence 
as  Fabulae  Praetextae  or  National  Dramas;1  and  of 
these  eight  we  have  scarcely  over  thirty  fragments 
of  a  few  words  each.  That,  however,  the  remains  of 
many  more  must  be  hidden  beneath  the  surface  of 
such  repositories  of  earlier  testimony  as  Livy, 
Dionysius,  Plutarch,  and  Ovid,  has  long  been 
recognized.  As  early  as  1859,  Otto  Jahn  suggested 
that  the  story  of  the  death  of  Sophoniba  (Livy, 
XXX,  12-16),  which  is  depicted  also  on  the 
famous  Pompeian  wall  painting,  owes  many  of 
its  dramatic  features  to  such  a  source.2  Reiffer- 
scheid's  review  of  Ribbeck  3  in  1880  urged  that 
Livy  in  several  of  the  most  vivid  scenes  was 
directly  under  the  influence  of  the  Praetextae. 
Ribbeck  in  1881  called  attention  to  the  strong 
internal  evidence  in  favor  of  such  a  source  for 
Livy's  account  of  the  siege  of  Veii  (V,  21:  8  ff.),4 
which  is  confirmed  by  the  explicit  statement  of  the 
writer  himself.5  It  was  not  till  1887,  however, 

1  It  is  impossible  to  draw  any  hard  and  fast  line  between  a  tragedy  and 
a  historical  drama  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  ancients.  To  the  Greek 
mind,  for  example,  the  characters  in  the  Agamemnon  of  Aeschylus  were 
as  truly  historical  as  those  in  the  Persians. 

*Jahn,  Der  Tod  der  Sophoniba  auf  einem  Wandgemalde  (Bonn,  1859), 
p.  12. 

*  Bursian's  Jahresbericht,  XXIII  (1880),  p.  265. 

«  Rhein.  Mus.,  XXXVI  (1881),  p.  321. 

5  haec  ad  ostentationem  scenae  gaudentis  miraculis  aptiora  quam  ad 
finem(V,21:9). 

[26] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

that  Meiser  made  the  first  serious  attempt  to 
designate  which  these  scenes  were,  with  the  ex- 
tent of  the  influence  of  the  Praetextae  upon  them, 
and  to  formulate  the  general  principles  for  the 
detection  of  a  hidden  Fabula  Praetexta.1  His  dis- 
cussion was  followed,  in  the  year  1893,  by  the  two 
of  Boissier  2  and  Schone.3 

Meiser  took  as  his  starting  point  for  restoring 
the  probable  structure  of  the  Republican  National 
Drama,  the  Octavia  of  the  imperial  period,  com- 
monly ascribed  to  Seneca,  the  authorship  and  date 
of  which  is,  however,  much  in  doubt.  With  the 
aid  of  the  suggestions  which  this  model  offered  as 
to  both  frame-work  and  treatment,  he  thought 
that  he  detected  the  influence  of  lost  Fabulae 
Praetextae  in  Livy's  account  of  the  events  at 
Capua  after  Cannae  (XXIII,  1-10),  in  his  story 
of  Perseus  and  Demetrius  (XL,  2-16, 20-24, 54-56), 
and  in  certain  chapters  of  Plutarch's  life  of  Caius 
Gracchus. 

Boissier,  writing  six  years  later,  was  led  to  lay 
very  much  less  stress  on  the  influence  of  these 
dramas  in  the  writing  of  history,  from  the  fact  that 
so  few  are  known  by  name  or  fragments.  This 
he  argued  was  a  proof  of  their  mediocre  success. 
He  based  his  conception  of  structure  and  treat- 
ment on  the  Iter  ad  Lentulum,  which  Pollio  ascribes 

1  Meiser,  t)ber  historische  Dramen  der  R8mer  (MUnchen,  1887). 

2  Boissier,  Les  Fabulae  Praetextae,  Revue  de  Phil.,  April,  1893. 

1  Schone,  Das  historische  Nationaldrama  der  Rttmer  (Kiel,  1898). 

[27] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

(Cicero,  Ep.  ad  Fam.,  X,  32)  to  a  certain  Balbus, 
and  briefly  describes.  Boissier  thought  that  he 
found  traces  of  a  drama  agreeing  with  such  a 
model  in  Ovid's  story  of  the  vestal  Claudia  (Fasti, 
IV,  305  ff.).  As  in  Ribbeck's  case,  external  evidence 
seemed  also  to  confirm  his  view.1 

Schone,  on  the  contrary,  in  a  much  more  ex- 
tensive study,  published  the  same  year,  cham- 
pioned the  old  view  that  both  the  material  and  the 
motive  of  many  Fabidae  Praetextae  had  passed 
over  into  Roman  History.  He,  however,  showed 
commendable  caution  in  his  criteria  for  then*  detec- 
tion, insisting  that  both  external  and  internal  evi- 
dence must  be  forthcoming  before  any  hypothesis 
could  be  accepted  as  demonstrated,  else  "the  study 
is  liable  to  become  a  mere  idle  game  with  possi- 
bilities and  probabilities."  Although  intimating 
that  the  stories  of  Tarpeia,  of  Cloelia,  of  the  mur- 
der of  Servius  Tullius,  of  the  punishment  of  the 
sons  of  Brutus,  and  of  Coriolanus,  owe  their  pres- 
ent form  to  dramatic  influence,  he  did  not  venture 
to  assert  this,  and  limited  his  claims  for  dramatic 
origin  to  the  two  stories  in  Dionysius  of  Halicarnas- 
sus,  of  the  Horatii  and  Curiatii  (III,  18),  and  of 
the  sacrifice  of  the  three  hundred  and  six  Fabii 
(IX,  22).  In  each  instance,  hi  addition  to  the  dra- 
matic features  within  the  story  itself,  Dionysius 
betrays  in  his  introduction  of  it,  by  the  word 
,  the  dramatic  source. 

1  scaena  testificata  loquar.    Fasti,  IV,  326. 
[28] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

Soltau,  in  the  recent  study  to  which  reference 
was  made  at  the  beginning  of  the  present  discussion, 
reviews  the  whole  subject  to  date  with  the  same 
exhaustiveness  and  balance  which  distinguishes  his 
work  on  Livy's  sources.  He  calls  attention  to  the 
possible  influence  of  the  Annals  of  Ennius  in  some 
places  where  dramatic  source  had  before  been 
postulated.  He  also  suggests  two  new  criteria 
for  the  detection  of  a  Fahula  Praetexta:  first,  the 
presence  of  structure,  plot,  or  incident  which  is 
plainly  borrowed  outright  from  Greek  myth; l  and 
second,  what  we  might  call  the  test  of  the  temper 
of  the  times.2  Applying  these  tests,  with  the  ones 
already  mentioned,  to  the  theories  of  his  prede- 
cessors and  also  to  new  material  garnered  from 
independent  reading  of  the  ancient  tradition,  he 
revises  the  list  of  what  he  calls  demonstrable 
Fabulae  Praetextae  so  that  it  includes  twenty  in  all, 
which  treat  subjects  ranging  in  time  from  Romulus 
to  the  embassy  of  Fabricius  to  Pyrrhus.  These  he 
assigns,  after  weighing  all  the  evidence,  to  either 
Naevius,  Ennius,  Pacuvius,  or  Accius. 

In  every  one  of  these  twenty  dramas,  then, 
either  actual  classifiable  fragments,  or  the  com- 
bination, in  a  suspected  passage  from  a  later  his- 
torian, of  involuntary  clue,  dramatic  structure  and 

1  Cf .  incidents  in  the  story  of  the  Sabine  women  with  similar  ones  in 
the  "Trojan  Women"  of  Euripides. 

2  For  example:   the  officials  at  Rome  hi  the  tunes  of  the  late  Republic 
would  never  have  permitted  the  presentation  or  publication  of  a  drama 
dealing  with  the  revolutionary  story  of  the  Gracchi  as  related  by  Plutarch. 

[29] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

incident,  patent  borrowing  from  Greek  drama,  and 
compatibility  with  the  temper  of  the  times,  re- 
veal the  traces  of  a  lost  play.  But  neither  from 
any  one  of  these  twenty  collections  of  remains, 
nor  from  a  selection  out  of  the  entire  collection  in 
an  attempt  to  supplement  parts  lacking  in  one 
specimen  by  those  preserved  in  another,  can  the 
articulated  structure  of  the  Roman  National 
Drama  be  made  out.  We  have  discovered  certain 
fossil  bones,  and  can  assert  positively  that  a  cer- 
tain form  of  dramatic  life  once  existed.  We  can- 
not, however,  like  Professor  Owen,1  build  up  the 
whole  structure  of  the  lost  fossil  from  one  tiny 
fragment,  for  we  have  no  assurance  that  either  of 
our  possible  models,  classical  Greek  Tragedy,  or 
the  Octavia  ascribed  to  Seneca,  belonged  to  the 
same  species.  At  the  present  time,  the  further 
study  of  the  structure  of  Roman  National  Drama 
would  seem  to  be  blocked  by  the  ignorance  of 
investigators  as  to  the  structural  anatomy  of  par- 
ticular species. 

That  this  structure  so  long  sought  after  is  to  be 
found  in  a  hitherto  undiscovered  Fabula  Praetexta 
which  lies  imbedded  practically  intact  in  a  chap- 
ter of  the  first  book  of  Livy;  and  that  this  fossil 
deposit,  in  addition  to  meeting  the  demands  of  all 
the  criteria  for  detection  of  lost  plays  —  of  exter- 
nal involuntary  clue,  of  dramatic  incident,  of 
patent  borrowing  from  Greek  sources,  and  of  com- 

1  Lankester,  Extinct  Animals,  pp.  67-70. 
[30] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

patibility  with  the  temper  of  the  times,  can,  in 
addition,  be  brought  into  relation  with  two  hitherto 
unclassified  fragments  of  a  Roman  dramatist,  the 
present  discussion  strives  to  demonstrate. 

"The  tradition  that  Servius  Tullius  had  had  both  a  mild 
and  a  violent  daughter,"  says  Soltau,1  in  discussing  the  debt 
of  Roman  historical  tradition  to  Greek  History,  "and  that 
the  latter  of  these  married  the  mild  Arnins,  while  the  former 
was  united  to  the  savage  Tarquinius  Superbus  —  whereupon 
the  violent  Tullia  sought  to  wed  Tarquinius  and  even  at- 
tained this  end  after  the  murder  of  her  own  husband  —  is 
nothing  but  a  Greek  story.  Thus  the  impious  daughters 
of  Danaus  were  wedded  to  husbands  of  mild  disposition  of 
whom  they  sought  to  rid  themselves." 

"Nothing  but  a  Greek  story"  may  be  too 
strong,  but  there  are  several  unusual  things  about 
sections  4-9  of  the  forty-sixth  chapter  of  the 
first  book  of  Livy,  in  which  the  above-mentioned 
story  is  related  in  detail.  The  first  is  brought  to 
our  attention  by  the  tense  of  the  verb  habuerat  in 
section  4.  It  is  a  pluperfect.  We  have  here,  then, 
not  a  continuation  of  the  narrative  interrupted  by 
section  3,  but  a  parenthetical  insertion  extending 
to  the  end  of  the  ninth  section,  the  time  of  action 
of  which  goes  back  to  a  period  preceding  that  of 
the  story  just  narrated.  In  sections  1-3,  Arruns 
Tarquinius  is  already  dead.  Lucius  is  married  to 
the  fierce  Tullia,  his  murdered  brother's  wife. 
Suddenly  the  narrative  stops.  The  reader  might 

1  Die  An&nge  d.  r8m.  Geschichtsch.,  p.  88. 
[31] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

wish  to  know  how  he  came  to  marry  her.  It  is 
one  of  those  instances  characteristic  of  Livy  which 
Soltau  notes,  where  the  author  —  or  his  source  — 
who  has  been  transcribing  as  he  read,  following 
chiefly  one  authority,  introduces  an  insertion  from 
a  variant  to  relieve  monotony.  In  a  modern  his- 
tory, sections  4-9,  which  are  a  complete  story  in 
themselves,  would  most  certainly  have  been  a 
footnote. 

A  second  point  in  these  sections  worthy  of  note 
is  the  solicitude  of  the  historian  because  his  new 
source  does  not  agree  with  the  common  tradition. 
"Whether  he  [Lucius  Tarquinius]  was  the  son  or 
grandson  of  Tarquinius  Priscus  is  not  clear;  but 
in  accordance  with  the  greater  number  of  author- 
ities, I  would  regard  him  as  son."  What  else  is 
this  than  the  annalist  from  whom  Livy  borrowed 
trying  to  reconcile  material  created  by  the  drama- 
tist for  artistic  purposes,  with  the  more  prosaic 
story  which  lay  before  him? 

Note  in  the  third  place  the  highly  symmetrical 
and  dramatic  structure  of  the  story  itself:  two 
pairs  of  characters  within  each  group,  one  the 
exact  antithesis  of  the  other;  two  brothers,  Lucius 
and  Arruns,  the  one  fiery  and  wicked,  the  other 
mild  and  good;  two  sisters,  Tullia  Ferox  and  Tullia 
Mitis,  the  latter  mild  and  good,  the  former  fiery 
and  wicked.1  By  the  kindly  dispensation  of  fate, 

1  The  duplication  of  characters  was  a  peculiarity  of  Roman  Drama. 
Cf.  the  Phormio  of  Terence. 

[32] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

as  if  deferring  the  awful  crimes  to  come,  good  is 
at  first  joined  to  bad  as  checkmate,  within  each 
group.  Soon  follows  the  inevitable  attraction  of  bad 
for  bad,  the  clandestine  meeting,  the  double  mur- 
der plotted,  and  then  the  close  of  the  tragedy  after 
this  murder  has  been  accomplished,  where  the  aged 
and  helpless  Servius,  who  is  to  be  the  next  victim 
of  Tullia's  bloody  rage,  protests  forebodingly, 
unable  to  stay  the  course  of  crime. 

Note  in  the  fourth  place  that  in  the  narrative, 
although  the  fierce  Tullia  and  the  mild  Arruns 
meet,  and  although  the  fierce  Tullia  and  the  fierce 
Lucius  meet,  neither  the  two  brothers  nor  the  two 
sisters  ever  meet  each  other.  On  the  supposition 
of  dramatic  origin  the  reason  for  this  is  not  far 
to  seek.  There  may  have  been  but  two  actors. 
One  actor  may  have  played  the  part  of  the  two 
brothers,  and  the  other  the  part  of  the  two  sisters, 
—  an  excellent  illustration  of  actors  in  ancient 
tragedy  playing  parts  absolutely  opposed,  villain 
and  hero. 

Note  in  the  fifth  place  a  fact  brought  into  promi- 
nence by  the  simple  word  funeribus.  There  is 
absolutely  no  detailed  account  of  the  actual 
murders.  If  the  word  be  translated  "funeral," 
"through  a  series  of  funerals"  —  and  this  is  its 
usual  meaning  in  Livy  (cf.  II,  7:4,  16:7,  33:11), 
this  absence  of  detail  is  more  striking.  But  even  if 
we  translate  it  "violent  death,"  why  the  absence 
of  detail?  We  are  told  that  in  the  clandestine 
[33] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

interview,  the  fierce  Tullia  quickly  inspired  Lucius 
Tarquin  with  her  own  boldness.  In  the  next 
sentence  she  and  the  fierce  youth  are  being 
married.  Is  not  the  annalist  here  plainly  following 
unconsciously,  almost  slavishly,  the  drama  before 
him,  in  which,  as  in  all  Greek  tragedy,  for  artistic 
reasons,  the  actual  murders  were  committed  off 
the  stage? 

Note  in  the  sixth  place,  that  one  of  the  few  prov- 
erbs in  the  first  book  of  Livy  occurs  in  the  sections 
which  we  are  considering :  Ut  fere  fit,  malum  malo 
aptissimum,  "As  generally  happens,  wickedness  is 
most  congenial  to  wickedness."  Now  this  cannot 
be  the  commonplace  remark  of  the  annalist,  for 
he  would  almost  certainly  have  used  the  ordinary 
form  of  the  proverb,  pares  cum  paribus  facillime 
congregantur,  which  Cicero  (Cato  Major,  7)  calls  the 
veins  proverbium,  and  which  is  merely  a  translation 
for  the  Greek  given  by  Plato.1  Why  does  Livy's 
narrative  have  the  qualifying  phrase  ut  fere  fit,  "as 
often  happens,"  and  why  is  the  author  not  con- 
tent to  make  use  of  the  general  proverb,  "Birds  of 
a  feather  flock  together"?  Why  too  does  this 
proverb  come  just  before  the  climax  of  the  story? 

When  I  first  suspected  that  we  might  have  the 
skeleton  of  a  drama  imbedded  in  these  sections  of 
Livy,  I  at  once  set  about  the  task  of  discovering 
what  had  become  of  the  choral  odes.  Had  there 
been  choruses,  for  example,  in  Shakespere,  how 

i  6/M-iov  bfjjolt-  tel  ireXdfei,  Symposium,  XVIII. 

[34] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

would  they  have  appeared,  what  traces  would 
they  have  left,  —  in  abstract,  in  the  Tales  from 
Shakespere  by  Charles  Lamb?  I  suspected  at  the 
start  that  they  would  have  left  a  trace  in  a  proverb 
or  moralization;  for  on  the  analogy  of  the  sermon, 
which  is  the  nearest  modern  parallel  to  the  choral 
ode  of  tragedy,  it  may  be  said  that  the  chorus 
starts  from,  and  returns  to,  a  single  proverb  as  its 
text.  I  tried  in  vain  to  find  the  Charles  Lamb  of 
ancient  Greek  tragedy.  I  sought  for  him  among 
the  writers  of  the  Hypotheses  and  in  Dion,  whose 
discussion  of  the  three  Philoctetes  plays  I  had 
hoped  might  yield  some  result.  But  the  search 
was  fruitless. 

My  attention  was  finally  directed  to  Alfred 
Church's  "Stories  from  the  Greek  Dramatists." 
Mr.  Church's  attempt  is  to  give  to  English  readers 
in  story  form,  following  the  original  as  closely  as 
possible,  but  avoiding  all  suggestion  of  dramatic 
structure,  the  contents  of  the  ancient  dramas.  No 
better  illustration  is  needed  of  what  becomes  of 
the  chorus  in  abstracting,  than  Mr.  Church's  treat- 
ment of  Aeschylus'  Seven  Against  Thebes.  Lines 
677-719,  the  exchange  of  dialogue  between  the 
chorus  and  Eteocles,  before  the  latter  goes  forth 
to  do  battle  with  his  brother,  Mr.  Church  thus 
summarizes:  "And  though  the  maidens  entreated 
with  many  words  that  he  would  not  do  this  thing, 
but  leave  the  place  to  some  other  of  the  chiefs, 
saying  there  was  no  healing  or  remedy  for  a 
[35] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

brother's  blood  shed  in  such  fashion,  he  would 
not  hearken,  but  armed  himself  and  went  forth 
to  battle."  What  is  Mr.  Church's  summary  of 
the  great  choral  ode  which  follows  in  lines  720- 
791?  A  single  sentence  at  the  end  of  the  para- 
graph just  quoted  —  an  apparently  isolated  prov- 
erb: "Thus  ever  doth  the  madness  of  men  work 
out  to  the  full  the  curses  of  the  Gods."  In 
abstracting,  then,  the  choral  ode  is  apt  to  become 
the  proverb.  The  sole  remains  of  the  illustrations 
from  history  and  life,  which  in  the  tragic  chorus 
are  used  to  fortify  and  establish  the  general  obser- 
vation, are  to  be  found  in  Mr.  Church's  introduc- 
tory phrase  "thus  ever;"  in  Livy's  ut  fere  fit. 

The  structure  of  a  didactic  or  ethical  choral  ode  is 
clear  from  an  analysis  of  the  main  choral  ode  of  the 
Octavia.  First  the  maxim  or  proverb  "popularity 
leads  to  destruction";  then,  the  illustration  from 
practical  life  —  the  ship  carried  by  the  favoring 
wind  into  the  raging  sea;  finally,  the  illustration 
from  Roman  Scripture  —  the  Gracchi  and  Drusus. 
Had  a  Roman  Charles  Lamb  given  us  an  abstract 
of  the  Octavia,  I  venture  to  suggest  that  the  trans- 
scriber  would  have  written  as  the  equivalent  of 
this  choral  ode,  simply  ut  fere  fit  multis  dims  favor. 
Ut  fere  fit  (i.e.,  as  in  the  case  of  the  ship,  and  of 
the  Gracchi,  and  of  Drusus)  multis  dims  favor 
(popularity  is  the  ruin  of  many  men). 

The  proverb,  then,  in  the  section  of  Livy  under 
consideration  probably  represents  the  main  chorus 
[36] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

of  our  tragedy,  the  burden  of  which  was  that  evil 
seeks  evil,  and  this  was  doubtless  illustrated  —  ut 
fere  fit  —  by  the  customary  range  of  examples  from 
nature  and  history. 

To  turn  again  to  the  dramatic  features  of  the 
paragraph,  it  might  be  asked  in  the  seventh  place 
whether  the  creative  and  rhetorical  genius  of  Livy 
himself  is  not  responsible  for  the  dramatic  struc- 
ture. A  comparison  of  the  account  in  Livy  with 
that  in  Dionysius  proves  at  once  and  conclusively 
that  Livy,  far  from  being  the  inventor,  is  not  even 
the  transcriber  of  the  Praetexta,  but  that  we  must 
refer  the  paraphrase  to  his  immediate  source,  which 
Dionysius  also  followed.  The  two  accounts,  except 
for  one  or  two  additional  facts  in  Dionysius  — 
there  are  absolutely  no  contradictions,  are  start- 
lingly  identical.  The  story  is  a  parenthesis  or 
footnote  in  Dionysius,  just  as  it  had  been  in  Livy. 
At  the  point  where  Livy  stopped  to  explain  how 
Lucius  Tarquinius  happened  to  be  married  to 
Tullia  Ferox,  Dionysius  stops  with  these  words 
(IV,  27,  end):  "When  now,  he  was  advanced  in 
years,  and  not  far  from  the  limits  of  a  natural  life, 
he  died  at  the  hands  of  his  son-in-law  Tarquinius 
and  of  his  own  daughter.  I  shall  describe  the  man- 
ner of  the  plot  after  I  have  related  some  events  which 
took  place  before."  Dionysius  also  shows  exactly 
the  same  solicitude  which  Livy  did  because  his 
new  romantic  source  does  not  agree  with  the  older 
authority,  Fabius  Pictor  (IV,  30),  whom  he  dis- 
[37] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

regards  as  illogical.  Dionysius  does  not,  it  is 
true,  give  us  the  proverb,  but  at  the  precise  point 
in  the  action  where  Livy  introduces  it,  he  has 
Tullia  Ferox  send  away  the  body  of  male  palace 
attendants  (TOVS  evSov,  IV,  29),  in  order  that  she 
may  hold  secret  converse  with  her  sister's  husband. 
What  better  time  for  the  moral  reflection  of  the 
chorus  that  evil  seeks  evil,  than  when  the  chorus 
is  sent  away  from  the  stage  to  allow  Tarquin  to 
enter  upon  the  secret  plot  of  murder.  In  Diony- 
sius' account,  too,  there  is  the  same  absence  of 
detail  regarding  the  actual  murder,  but  the  single 
phrase  which  refers  to  it  betrays  the  dramatic 
introduction  of  the  two  bodies,  side  by  side, 
on  the  e/cKv/cA^a  —  the  final  instance  of  the 
"pairing"  which  has  been  characteristic  of  the 
play,  "shortly  thereafter  they  died  of  one  and  the 
same  death."1 

There  are  three  additions  in  Dionysius  to  the 
account  in  Livy:  (1)  a  scene  in  which  the  good 
Tullia  tries  to  convert  the  bad  Tarquin;  (2) 
monologue  scenes  by  the  two  Tulliae;  (3)  the 
words  of  the  actual  appeal  of  the  bad  Tullia  to  the 
bad  Tarquin,2  given  in  direct  discourse  at  great 

1This  sentence  is  the  sole  trace  to  be  found  in  the  paraphrase  of 
a  possible  messenger's  narrative  explaining  the  details  of  the  double 
murder. 

1  "Dionysius  was  not  accustomed  to  make  his  speeches  out  of  whole 
cloth.  He  inserted  them  where  his  sources  mentioned  such.  'The  chief 
thoughts  in  his  speeches,  the  essential  facts  in  them,  he  took  from  his  source, 
but  worked  them  over  in  detail.'" 

Soltau,  Livius'  Geschichtswerk,  p.  184. 

[38] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

length,1  the  same  scene  which  is  summarized  by 
Livy  2  in  the  simple  phrase  celeriter  adulescentem 
suae  temeritatis  implet.  This  is  of  course  the 
climax  of  the  play,  and  Dionysius  has  fortunately 
preserved  for  us  in  his  transcript  the  very  evi- 
dent clue  of  its  dramatic  origin,  —  the  address  to 
Tarquin  as  "Child  of  Heracles." 

But  finally,  and  most  conclusive  of  all,  if  we 
turn  back  to  the  sentence  which  precedes  this 
parenthetical  paragraph  of  the  forty -sixth  chapter, 
so  artistically  and  dramatically  complete,  we 
find  that  it  is  introduced  by  the  very  external 
indirect  clue  of  a  hidden  drama  which  Scheme 
demanded  —  "For  the  Roman  palace  also  afforded 
an  instance  of  guilt  fit  for  a  tragedy  (tragici)," 
(Livy,  I,  46:3).3 

1  "The  fact  deserves  to  be  especially  emphasized  that  the  sources  which 
Dionysius  follows  for  the  older  Roman  history  up  to  the  Decemvirate,  are 
especially  full,  and  depict  details  with  great  clearness  for  precisely  those 
portions  where  the  Roman  National  Drama  had  suggested  material  to  the 
phantasy  and  heart  of  the  Romans." 

Sdtau,  Die  Anfange  d.  rom.  Ges.,  p.  128,  n.  1. 

2  The  absence  of  the  speech  at  this  point  in  Livy  would  be,  in  itself, 
fairly  good  evidence  of  its  existence  in  the  original  from  which  he  and 
Dionysius  drew.    Livy's  custom  is  to  invent  speeches  outright  at  points 
where  they  have  not  been  suggested  before,  and  not  to  reproduce  or  even 
work  over  in  the  same  setting  those  existing  already.    Thus  in  his  account 
of  Cannae  he  ignores  the  speeches  of  Paulus  and  Hannibal  to  their  troops 
before  the  battle,  which  were  worked  out  by  an  earlier  source,  Polybius, 
but  inserts  some  of  his  own  invention  at  other  unexpected  points. 

1  This  phrase  evidently  escaped  Schone,  for  he  says,  commenting  on 
Livy's  admission  of  a  dramatic  source  for  the  siege  of  Veil,  "Zwar  bei 
Livius  selbst  ist  mir  eine  zweite  ahnliche  Ausserung  nicht  erinnerlich" 
(Schone,  ibid.,  p.  13). 

[391 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  give  an  outline  of 
our  so-called  Tullia,  following  step  by  step  the 
narrative  of  Livy,  which  is  confirmed  throughout 
by  Dionysius,  and  is  in  three  instances  supple- 
mented by  him. 

The  Praetexta  need  not  have  had  but  two  actors, 
one  of  whom  played  the  part  of  the  two  Tarquins 
and  Servius;  the  other  that  of  the  two  Tullias  (and 
perhaps  also  their  mother,  cf.  Diony.,  IV,  30:4). 

The  chorus  consisted  of  male  attendants  in  the 
palace  (TOU?  evSov,  Diony.,  IV,  29:1). 

The  scene  is  laid  in  the  palace  of  Servius  (Ro- 
mana  regia,  Livy,  I,  46:3). 

The  play  opens  with  a  prologos,  spoken  probably 
by  the  despairing  old  king,  thoroughly  Euripidean 
in  its  expository  purpose,  telling  the  earlier  facts 
about  the  ill-mated  pairs  (Hie  L.  Tarquinius  .  .  . 
fratrem  habuerat  Arruntem  Tarquinium  mitis  ingenii 
juvenem.  His  duobus  .  .  .  duae  Tulliae  regis  filiae 
nupserant,  et  ipsae  longe  dispares  moribus,  Livy,  I, 
46:4-5). 

Then  follows  the  parodos,  in  which  the  chorus 
of  palace  attendants  renders  thanks  to  the  Gods 
that  the  Fates  have  kept  the  two  bad  characters 
apart  so  long,  and  prays  that  the  rule  of  Servius 
may  continue  and  the  morals  of  the  state  have  time 
to  be  established  (Forte  ita  indderat  ne  duo  violenta 
ingenia  matrimoniojungerentur,fortuna  credo  populi 
Romani,  quo  diuturnius  Servi  regnum  esset  consti- 
tuique  civitatis  mores  possent,  Livy,  I,  46:5).* 
[40] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

Next  comes  the  first  epeisodion,  related  only  in 
Dionysius,  between  the  good  Tullia  and  the  bad 
Tarquin  —  the  fruitless  attempt  of  a  good  woman 
to  convert  a  bad  man  (6  /w,eV  ye  Trovrjpos  €/c/3aX€u> 
TTJS  /SacrtXetag  TOV  /ojSeoTrp  TrpoOvfJiOvpevo^  /cat  TTOLVTO. 
fjLr)-%CLV(ofji€vos  els  TOVTO  VTTO  rrjs  -yvz/at/co?  pereirtidero 
avTij3o\ovo-r)<;  re  /cat  oSv/aeyteVrj?,  Diony.,  I,  28:3). 

Then  follows  the  second  epeisodion,  narrated  by 
both  Livy  and  Dionysius,  between  the  bad  Tullia 
and  her  good  husband,  the  equally  fruitless  at- 
tempt of  a  bad  woman  to  corrupt  a  good  man. 
"Tullia,  being  a  violent  woman,  was  chagrined 
that  there  was  no  stuff  in  her  husband  either 
for  ambition  or  bold  daring.  Attracted  wholly 
toward  the  other  Tarquin,  she  said  that  he  was  a 
man,  one  truly  descended  from  royal  blood;  she 
expressed  contempt  for  her  sister  because  having 
got  a  real  husband  she  was  deficient  in  the  spirit 
becoming  a  woman  (Angebatur  ferox  Tullia  nihil 
materiae  in  viro  neque  ad  cupiditatem  neque  ad 
audaciam  esse;  iota  in  alterum  aversa  Tarquinium 
eum  mirari,  eum  virum  dicere  ac  regio  sanguine 
ortum;  spernere  sororem  quod  virum  nacta  muliebri 
cessaret  audacia,i,ivy  1, 46 : 6.  6  8'  eVtet/c^s  ov8ei>  oto/ic- 
vos  8eu>  c^anaprdveiv  €ts  TOV  TrevQepov,  dXXa  Trcyot/xej/eu/, 
ecus  rj  <f>v(Ti<;  avrbv  IK  TOV  ^rjv  e^ayay^,  /cat  TOV  aoe\- 
<j)ov  OVK  ea>v  irpaTTtw  TO.  fir)  8t/caia,  VTTO  T^S  aVocrtas 
ywat/cos  CTTI  Tavavria  /acT^yero  i/oufleTOvcrqs  re  /cat 
/cat  TYJV  avavSpiav  /ca/ct^ovcrr^s,  Diony., 
[41] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

IV,  28:3).  "But,"  adds  Dionysius,  "she  was 
unable  to  incite  her  husband  to  commit  a  crime." 

Dionysius  then  gives  us  the  germs  of  two  mono- 
logue scenes,  in  the  first  of  which  the  good  Tullia 
resigns  herself  to  her  lot  with  lamentation  (177  /xev 
o&vpecrOai  re  /ecu  <j>€peu>  TOV  tavTrjs  Saifjiova  Trcpirji/, 
IV,  28:4),  and  in  the  second  the  bad  Tullia  raves 
and  seeks  to  be  freed  from  her  husband  (rf)  Se 
TravToX^toj  ^a\€Tra.iveiv  /ecu  aTraXXay^^at  fyrtiv  CITTO 
rov  crwoi/cowTOs,  IV,  28:4). 

Now  the  crisis  comes.  The  bad  woman  de- 
cides to  send  for  the  bad  man.  At  this  point  we 
have  the  choral  ode,  the  burden  of  which  is  that 
evil  seeks  evil  (Ut  fere  fit  malum  malo  aptissimum, 
Livy ,  I,  46:7).  Calamity  has  begun.  The  fates  can 
no  longer  keep  two  violent  natures  apart.  As  the 
chorus  of  palace  attendants  leaves  the  stage  at  the 
orders  of  their  mistress,  chanting  this  theme,1 
Lucius  Tarquin  enters,  having  been  secretly  sum- 
moned by  the  woman  (initium  turbandi  omnia 
femina  ortum  est,  Livy,  I,  46:7). 

The  epeisodion  which  follows  —  the  clandestine 
plot  scene  which  is  the  climax  of  the  tragedy,  given 
in  outline  in  Livy  (Ea  secretis  .  .  .  videat,  I,  46:7, 
8),2  is  presented  in  full  in  Dionysius  as  follows: 

lTbis  exit  during  the  play  was  permissible  for  the  Roman  Chorus. 
Cf.  Hermes,  II,  p.  228. 

*  Livy  uses  some  of  the  dialogue  of  this  scene  in  an  entirely  different 
connection,— in  the  attempt  of  Tullia,  after  this  murder,  to  incite  Lucius 
to  kill  Servius.  This  is  of  course  positive  proof  of  its  existence  in  the  origi- 
nal from  which  both  Livy  and  Dionysius  drew.  See  p.  39,  n.  2. 

[42] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

•  "When  he  (Lucius)  had  come  thither,  having  bidden 
the  attendants  to  depart  that  she  and  Lucius  might  con- 
verse with  one  another  in  strict  private,  she  thus  began: 
'O  Tarquin,  may  I  say  to  thee  freely  and  without  fear 
what  I  feel  concerns  the  common  advantage  of  us  two?  And 
wilt  thou  keep  silent  regarding  what  thou  mayest  chance 
to  hear?  Or  were  it  better  that  I  spoke  not  at  all  nor  revealed 
the  secret  thoughts  of  my  heart?'  But  when  Tarquin  bade 
her  say  what  she  would,  and  promised  with  an  oath  that  he 
would  not  reveal  any  word  which  she  might  choose  to  tell, 
then  laying  aside  all  modesty  she  addressed  him.  'How 
long,  O  Tarquin,  dost  thou  propose  to  suffer  thyself  to  be 
deprived  of  thy  kingdom?  Is  it  that  thou  art  sprung  from 
lowly  and  obscure  forefathers,  and  for  this  reason,  darest 
not  have  lofty  thoughts  for  thine  own  best  interests?  Nay, 
all  men  know  that  thy  ancestors  of  yore  were  Greeks  and 
sprung  from  great  Hercules  himself.  For  many  generations, 
as  I  hear,  at  Corinth  they  held  sway.  Thy  grandfather 
Tarquin  coming  hither  from  Etruria  ruled  this  city  through 
his  might.  Thou  art  the  heir  not  alone  to  his  wealth,  but 
also  to  his  rulership,  as  elder  grandson.  Is  it  that  thou 
hast  a  body  so  weak  and  deformed  that  it  sufficeth  thee  not 
to  do  what  kings  must  perform?  Nay  thou  hast  strength 
such  as  have  those  of  perfect  powers,  and  in  form  thou  art 
like  a  king.  Perhaps  it  is  neither  of  these  things.  Dost 
thou  then  think  thyself  too  young  and  immature  for  states- 
manship, thou,  who  art  not  far  from  fifty  years  of  age? 
Truly  at  precisely  such  a  time  of  life  men  reason  best.  Come 
now,  tell  me.  Is  it  the  princely  retinue  of  the  present  king 
and  his  popularity  with  the  best  of  the  citizens  which  makes 
thee  check  thyself?  If  thou  would'st  know  the  truth,  both 
parties  hold  him  in  contempt,  nor  is  he  himself  unaware  of 
it.  Boldness  and  scorn  of  danger,  which  he  who  would 
be  king  must  have,  are  thine  own  traits.  Money,  and 
friends  in  plenty,  and  other  helps  for  such  an  undertaking, 

[43] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

are  at  thy  command  in  rich  abundance.  Why  then  dost 
thou  still  delay,  and  wait  for  an  opportunity  to  come  of  its 
own  accord  which  shall  present  the  kingdom  to  thee  who 
hast  done  nothing  for  it,  after  the  death  of  Tullius  perhaps? 
Just  as  if  Fate  waited  upon  human  dilatoriness,  and  nature 
postponed  death  to  old  age,  and  as  if  everything  human 
were  not  at  the  mercy  of  the  unfathomable  and  unexpected ! 
But  I  will  tell  thee  freely,  call  me  bold  woman  though 
thou  mayest,  why  thou  really  strivest  not  either  for  honor 
or  for  rank.  Thou  hast  a  wife,  in  way  of  thought  unlike 
thyself.  Thee,  with  her  caresses  and  her  flattery,  she  has 
made  a  weakling,  and  through  her  thou  wilt  become  — 
though  thou  mayest  not  even  be  aware  of  it  —  a  mere 
nothing  in  place  of  a  man.  So  I  too  have  a  mate,  a  cringing 
man,  with  no  man  in  him,  who  holds  me  back,  me  worthy 
of  greater  things,  and,  fair  of  body  though  I  be,  causes  me 
to  wither  away.  Had  it  but  been  granted  to  thee  to  take  me 
to  wife,  and  to  me  to  secure  thee  as  my  husband,  we  had 
not  lived  so  long  a  time  obscure  and  unknown.  Why  should 
we  not  by  exchange  of  marriage  rectify  the  errors  of  Fate? 
Make  thou  an  end  of  thy  wife's  life!  I  will  do  the  same  with 
my  husband.  These  hindrances  once  removed,  let  us  be 
united.  Then  freed  from  these  sorry  obstacles  we  may 
with  safety  plan  yet  more.  For  though  in  other  things  one 
fears  to  commit  wrong,  when  kingdoms  are  the  stakes,  one 
dares  to  venture  all'  (Diony.,  IV,  29). 

"When  Tullia  had  thus  spoken,"  concludes  Dionysius, 
"Tarquin  gladly  undertook  the  affair  and  straightway  gave 
her  pledges,  and  receiving  hers  in  turn,  departed." 

Then  comes  the  obvious  and  ominous  break  in 
the  story  in  both  Livy  and  Dionysius,  when  the 
murder  was  committed  behind  the  scenes,  for  which 
naturally  no  equivalent  exists  in  the  abstract. 

[44] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

The  concluding  scene  of  the  tragedy  is  given  in 
both  Livy  and  Dionysius  (Livy,  1,46:9;  Diony.,  IV, 
30:1,  4).  From  behind  the  scene  the  two  bodies  of 
Arrims  and  Tullia  Mitis  are  borne  in  with  funeral 
pomp,  and  Lucius  Tarquin  and  Tullia  Ferox  depart 
to  be  joined  in  unholy  wedlock.  After  this  the 
aged  father  and  mother  mourn  over  the  dead  bodies 
of  daughter  and  son-in-law,  daring  not  to  hinder 
triumphant  crime,  and  filled  with  ominous  fore- 
boding of  the  more  terrible  crime  still  to  come. 


Who  was  the  author  of  this  tragedy? 

From  the  time  of  Niebuhr  *  it  has  been  held  that 
the  events  in  early  Roman  history  centering  about 
the  Tar  quins  and  Brutus  constitute  an  epic  whole. 
But  that  within  this  larger  cycle  there  existed,  to 
the  minds  of  the  Romans  at  least,  another  artis- 
tically complete  division  which  we  may  term  a 
dramatic  whole,  is  evidenced  from  several  sources. 
In  a  chorus  of  the  Octavia  we  find  this  reference: 

"Tullia  and  her  husband  Tarquin  paid 
The  penalty  for  sins  unspeakable. 
Over  her  murdered  father's  form  she  drove 
Her  cruel  chariot,  and  the  furious  child 
Refused  her  murdered  father's  corpse  a  grave."  l 

1  Niebuhr,  History  of  Rome,  Vol.  I  (Philadelphia,  1844),  p.  137. 

2  Seneca,  Octavia,  lines  304-309  (Miss  Harris'  translation). 

[45] 


THE  RECOVERY  OF 

Livy  himself  also,  or  his  source,  without  ques- 
tion, regarded  the  history  of  Tarquin  the  Proud, 
from  the  time  of  the  double  murder  of  his  wife 
and  brother  to  his  expulsion  by  Brutus,  as  a 
dramatic  whole.  In  introducing  the  passage  on 
which  our  present  study  is  based  he  designates 
precisely  the  above  limits  as  a  theme  "fit  for 
tragedy."1  The  passage  divides  naturally  into 
three  parts,  the  Crime  of  Tullia,  the  Murder  of 
Servius,  and  the  Revenge  of  Brutus.  Now  this 
latter  subject,  Brutus,  we  know  to  have  been  the 
theme  of  the  most  famous  of  the  national  dramas 
of  Accius.  Are  we  to  suppose  that  this  Brutus, 
the  burden  of  which  was  "crime  avenged,"  did 
not  have  connected  with  it  either  organically,  as 
parts  of  a  trilogy,  or  inorganically  through  in- 
dependent but  theme-related  plays,  two  other 
tragedies,  "crime  in  its  inception"  and  "crime 
at  its  height"  —  in  other  words  a  Tullia  and  a 
Servius?  "The  Roman  palace  also,"  says  Livy, 
"afforded  an  instance  of  guilt  fit  for  a  tragedy." 
Why  "also,"  if  the  writer  is  not  thinking  of  that 
other  great  instance  at  Mycenae,  portrayed  in 
the  Orestean  trilogy  of  Aeschylus,  on  which  this 
Roman  trilogy  which  he  outlines  was  modeled? 
Were  further  evidence  needed  to  prove  a  close 
connection  between  the  Agamemnon  story  and 

1  Tulit  enim  et  Romano,  regia  sceleris  tragici  exemplum,  ut  taedio  regum 
maturior  veniret  libertas,  ultimumque  regnum  esset  quod  scelere  partum  foret 
(1,46:3). 

[46] 


A  LOST  ROMAN  TRAGEDY 

the  Tarquin-Brutus  tale,  it  could  be  found  in 
the  characters  themselves.  What  is  Tullia  Ferox 
but  a  Romanized  Clytemnestra,  Arruns  Tarquinius 
but  an  unsuspecting  Agamemnon,  Lucius  Tar- 
quinius but  a  remodeled  Aegisthus,  and  Brutus  but 
an  adapted  Orestes? 

That  Lucius  Accius  was  the  author  of  the  Tuttia 
which  Livy  and  Dionysius  have  preserved  for  us 
with  structure  almost  intact,  is  extremely  probable. 
He  had  himself  written  a  trilogy,  the  theme  of 
which  was  the  Clytemnestra  story.1  But  most 
conclusive  of  all  are  two  hitherto  unclassified  frag- 
ments ascribed  to  him  by  Cicero,  which  would 
seem  almost  certainly  to  belong  to  the  story  of  the 
double  murder: 

"Mulier  una  duom  virum" 

"Video  sepulchra  duo  duorum  corporum." 2 


1  Aegisthus,  Clytemnestra,  Agamemnonidae  or  Erigona.    Ribbeck,  Scaen. 
Rom.  Pos.  Prag.,  pp.  160-165. 
1  Ribbeck.  ibicL,  pp.  25«,  256. 


[47] 


